The Qt Company

The Qt Company provides a comprehensive cross-platform software development framework that enables businesses to design, develop, and deploy applications and user interfaces (UIs) from a single codebase across various operating systems and devices. The company's origins trace back to 1990, when Norwegian programmers Haavard Nord and Eirik Chambe-Eng conceived the idea for an object-oriented GUI framework while working on a C++ database application for ultrasound images that needed to run on multiple platforms. This led to the founding of their first company, Trolltech, in 1994, and the initial public release of the Qt framework in May 1995.

The Qt framework has a rich history of ownership changes, starting with Trolltech, which went public in 2006. Nokia acquired Trolltech in 2008 to use Qt for its mobile devices but later sold the commercial licensing business to the Finnish company Digia in 2011, followed by the complete acquisition of the technology and business in 2012. In 2016, Digia spun off the Qt business into The Qt Company, which is now a publicly traded entity on the Nasdaq Helsinki exchange.

The company's business model is centered on a dual-licensing structure, offering both open-source and commercial licenses. Revenue is primarily generated through the sale of developer licenses, which are required for each developer using the commercial version of the framework, and distribution licenses, which entail a per-device fee for products shipped with Qt-based software. This model serves a wide array of industries, including automotive, consumer electronics, industrial automation, and medical devices, with major clients like Mercedes-Benz, LG, and Panasonic utilizing the technology. The firm also earns revenue from professional services, training, and support and maintenance.

The core product is the Qt framework, a C++ based toolkit that extends the language with features like signals and slots to facilitate the creation of graphical user interfaces and complex applications. It allows developers to write code once and compile it for various platforms such as Windows, macOS, Linux, Android, iOS, and embedded systems, significantly reducing development time and resources. The ecosystem includes a suite of tools like Qt Creator (an IDE), Qt Design Studio for UI prototyping, and recently acquired quality assurance tools like Squish and Axivion to support the entire software development lifecycle.

Keywords: cross-platform framework, GUI development, embedded systems, software development tools, C++, application framework, dual-licensing, UI design, automotive software, IoT